Service tray



April 5, 1949.

M. BRUCKNER ET AL SERVICE TRAY INVENTOR. BRUCKNER BRUCKNER Filed Nov. .14, 1947 ATTORN EY Patented Apr. 5, 1949 SERVICE TRAY Martha L. Bruckner and William S. Bruckner,

Multnomah, reg.; William S. Bruckner assignor to Martha L. Bruckner Application November 14, 1947, Serial No. 786,066

1 Claim. 1

This invention is directed to a service tray designed more particularly for use in serving food from restaurants to customers in automobiles under the well-known drive-in service; and particularly constructed for use in connection with materials which, when served with the food, are not required to be returned to the restaurant after use of the tray and the food carried thereon.

A further object of the invention is the provision of a tray formed with a view of insuring reasonable stability on the lap or other support used by the customer in reaching the food with the tray formed to prevent articles in which the food is served from casual separation from the tray during the use thereof.

The invention is illustrated in the accompanying drawings in which Figure 1 is a perspective view of the improved tray, showing the application thereon of several diiierent types of food containers.

Figure 2 is a plain view of the blank from which the tray is formed.

Figure 3 is an end view of the tray, showing the tray adapted to provide the tray handles.

Figure 4 is a broken perspective view, showing the connection between the supporting walls of the tray.

Figure 5 shows a section of the fiber board with the intermediate brace strip from which the tray as a whole may be provided.

Figure 6 is a sectional view of the device showing one of the handles projecting from the top surface of the tray showing the reinforcement of the material used of which Figure 5 shows a cross section.

The improved tray comprises a top, having relatively narrow depending supporting walls 2, bent at right angles to the top as indicated in Figure 3.

Similar walls 3 depend from the top I, the walls 3 being of similar dimensions to thewalls 2, and the latter having integral end strips 4 which may be bent at right angles to the wall 2 and secured to the inner side of the walls 3, as indicated in Fig. 4. The walls 3 are cut of the blank from Which the tray is formed as indicated at 5 in Fig. 2, so that, when the walls are turned down from the top portion to form supports, the aligned projections 6 formed by the cut-out portions 5 are left in the plane of the body I to pro- 2 vide laterally extending handles by which the tray may be handled.

The top portion l is formed with means for receiving articles to be placed on the tray in the servicing use to prevent such articles from being separated from the tray while being handled, except when directly removed. For example the body of the tray is formed with openings 9 and 40. These openings are to receive and support receptacles H and L2, which, are thus held in more or less security in th handling of the tray. The body is also formed with an opening [3, the opening being preferably rectangular in form and designed more particularly to receive sandwiches and like articles of food. The sandwiches are inserted in the opening l3, as shown in Fig. 1.

The tray is preferably formed of paper sufficiently rigid to carry materials to be placed thereon and, if preferred, may, as illustrated in Fig. 5 be constructed of light fiber board in upper and lower portions with the conventional intermediate brace 14.

The top portion l is provided in one portion with out out narrow strips 15, bent upwardly from their judgement ends to receive and casually hold an article such as straw It as in Fig. 1. Similar lips I! are cut from the top portion to receive and causally hold a conventional spoon, fork and knife, or either, the spoon being shown at l8.

The tray is formed from a blank having cuts or lines to form the openings and the aligned projections when the tray is set up for use.

For instance the blank is shown in Fig. 2, and when a tray is wanted, the depending walls are bent down along the lines a-b--cd; their ends are secured together as shown in Fig. 4. Because of the cuts C, this leaves the aligned projections extending beyond the top to provide convenient handles, while the openings below the projections provide convenient spaces for insertion of the fingers to grasp the projections. When the side walls are formed, the desired openings of the containers are formed by punching out the material within the confines of the kerfs f, g and h.

What we claim is:

A disposable service tray comprising, in combination, a single piece of sheet material formed with a central rectangular horizontal tray portion having extensions folded vertically on each side thereof, a rectangular opening in said tray portion for receiving and supporting a sandwich, two circular openings of different diameters in said tray portion for receiving liquid containers of different sizes, a plurality of H-shaped slots in said tray portion and forming opposed fingers to be bent up for overlying and holding implements on said tray portion, integral handles on opposite sides of and horizontally rigid with said tray portion and formed by portions cut from two of said extensions, said extensions being of equal length to support said tray portion at a height to accommodate-Junkies seatedin said" opening; tabs on the-ends of two opposed=-'extensions' and bent to abut the end portions of the intermediate extensions, and means securing said tabs to said intermediate portions for forming a rigid structure.

MARTHA L. BRUCKNER. WILLIAM S. BRUCKNER.

REFERENCES CITED The following references are of record in the file of this patent:

UNITED STATES PATENTS Number Name Date 948,524 Reid Feb. 8, 1910 1,0642818 Bloombergm, June 17, 1913 i6 2,135,021 'Zalkind Nov. 1, 1938 

